China may have provided nuclear weapons design to Pakistan: Declassified CIA document
Source: Press Trust of India
China might have provided its close ally Pakistan a fairly comprehensive package of proven nuclear weapons design in late 1970s and the CIA knew about it, according to a recently declassified document.
"The CIA had evidence suggesting close Pakistan-China nuclear cooperation, to the point of facilitating a nuclear weapons capability, although the intelligence community saw this as possibly a special case based on an alliance that had existed since 1963," according to recently declassified CIA data, obtained by the National Security Archive (NSA) under the Freedom of Information Act.
According to the document, this allegation has come up before, for example in a state department document and in major news stories but this is the first time the CIA has released some of its own information.
"The estimate highlights some of the main developments, including 'verbal consent (in 1974) to help Pakistan develop a nuclear blast capability', 'hedged and conditional commitment' in 1976 to provide nuclear weapons technology, and unspecified excised information that raised the possibility that China has provided a fairly comprehensive package of proven nuclear weapon design information," it said.
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Read more: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/China-may-have-provided-nuclear-weapons-design-to-Pakistan-Declassified-CIA-document/articleshow/19707790.cms
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)leveymg
(36,418 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)He spent his presidency touring America's golf courses.
At the time, I thought he would go down in history for the word, "Fore!"
leveymg
(36,418 posts)The five extra innings that followed were just decline into madness. And that says a lot considering what happened under Nixon.
bananas
(27,509 posts)China provided nuclear weapons designs to Pakistan?
Last Updated: Wednesday, April 24, 2013, 09:27
<snip>
Significant portions of the document covering technology sharing are excised, but more may be learned if additional details are released under appeal, the NSA added.
With nuclear proliferation a policy priority for the Jimmy Carter administration, and Pakistan already a special concern, the possibility that China and Pakistan were sharing nuclear weapons-related information began worrying US government officials, NSA said.
However, the CIA had no hard evidence--and the soft evidence that concerned them is massively excised in the December 1979 report just as Beijing and Washington were normalising relations-so the "precise nature and extent of this cooperation is uncertain," the NSA said.
"These concerns did not go away during the Reagan administration. While nuclear proliferation was not a top priority, the administration was apprehensive about the implications of the spread of nuclear capabilities and that China may have been aiding and abetting some potential proliferators by selling non-safeguarded nuclear materials," NSA said.
(Note: NSA refers to the National Security Archive, not the National Security Agency).
DallasNE
(7,392 posts)So I'm not sure what to make of this since it seems so out of step that Carter was attempting nuclear proliferation. Do you have another source making this same point because this really isn't passing the smell test.
bananas
(27,509 posts)It doesn't say that Carter was attempting proliferation, it says the opposite.
Those paragraphs seem to be taken directly from the National Security Archives page on this: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/nukevault/ebb423/
DallasNE
(7,392 posts)It is only after reading on that you get the sense that they were talking about a non-proliferation policy in the face of proliferation in Pakistan.
kitt6
(516 posts)Today China. Not wasting much time are we?
John2
(2,730 posts)if you tell us who the U.S. provided this technology to, since we are the first country to have this technology? The second country was Russia, then followed by China,the United Kingdom and France. India also received the technology along with South Africa and Israel. Countries were getting these weapons because they feared without them, their adversaries would have a military advantage. The U.S. could not stop India from testing nuclear weapons and India openly defied International Law. North Korea is not the first. Israel want even allow the International community to inspect their nuclear facilities. The U.S. has also shared or placed nuclear weapons in other countries such as Germany or Canada since they are Allies. When it comes to any debate about nuclear weapons, no country can claim the moral high ground. They all are trying to gain an advantage over the battle field. Nuclear weapons has changed conventional war fare and only one country has ever used them. Nuclear warfare threatens the existence of man kind period. Ronald Reagan was an idiot for even suggesting winning a nuclear conflict. There is no tested evidence, a missile shield can stop a nuclear attack. These are only theories. And if anyone knows about science, theories are not scientific facts or proven evidence.
DallasNE
(7,392 posts)China had a fallout with the Soviet Union and India was an ally of the Soviet Union. That would naturally drive the US and China in the same direction in the India-Pakistan dispute. This is also about the same time as Nixon's trip to China and the start of the thaw between the two countries. The problem is that somebody needed to slow walk some of the below the radar changes that were taking place and question who's interest was really being served by these decisions. While the odds are high that Pakistan would have gotten the bomb there was certainly no need to fast track those efforts because they have more and better weapons than they otherwise would have today.
closeupready
(29,503 posts)Picked fights with both Pakistan and China. Have committed untold human rights abuses in Kashmir. Meddled in Sri Lanka.
Not exactly the type of neighbor you want to be powerless against, more like a bully.
El Progreso
(21 posts)Does it mean that it may have not, too?
dballance
(5,756 posts)Just another one of the weaselly-worded sentences that is worded to try to say someone is guilty without really saying. It also gives the person/organization making the statement the weasel room later, if proven wrong, to say they never said xyz was guilty of causing abc.
Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)We help our allies with tech, why would China be any different.
I believe there is some tension between China and India and India and Pakistan hate each other.